Philosophy of the Void

I have an ongoing discussion with one of my friends about teleportation. Suppose some day a scientist invents a teleportation device. You walk in one end, your body is zapped, and you reemerge in another location (think Star Trek). Will the person who emerges from the other end have the same consciousness as the person who was zapped? I’m skeptical. The being that reemerges will surely act like the same person if reconstruction is perfect. This will lead others to believe that the transportation was successful. However, I think the person who walked in is effectively dead. Let’s think of it this way – if the same device was used to clone somebody, would the clone and the original share a single consciousness? I don’t think that’s plausible. This raises a scary prospect – if teleportation becomes feasible and popular, there will appear to be no problem until you walk in, and your life will end right there. Everybody else will carry on as usual, thinking the being that emerged from the other end is you.

On the other hand, this type of dynamic might be more common than we realize. For example, suppose our consciousness dies every time we sleep. The being that wakes up the next morning retains the same memories, so there will be no realization that something is out of place. Carpe diem takes on a new meaning here. Literally, today is the first and last day of your existence.

Living in an era of postmodern relativism, is it impossible to derive morals and values except through reference to arbitrary assumptions? In our era, people often pick up their values as children. Once one reaches maturity, these values become objects of deconstruction and questioning. Sometimes, the outcome is unquestioning faith. In this category, one could place devout believers in any religion, fanatics, and serial killers. For those who are too skeptical or complex to subscribe to a single belief system of this sort, an ambivalent equilibrium might be reached. In this state, one holds relativistic beliefs but acts in accordance with hunch or moral values carried over from youthful indoctrination. If this duality collapses, people seem to fall into an extreme ambivalence that could be described as a sort of state of nature. All of these categories are at once attractive and unsatisfactory. Ultimately, it seems to be a matter of choice.

I just came by an article that Stone Age settlements were found submerged off the coast of Great Britain. I’ve always wondered about the possibility that archaeological remnants from unknown early civilizations lie underwater. A cursory Google search turns up several recent discoveries of this sort, although the date of these sites remains in question. The accepted wisdom suggests that human civilization first arose in Mesopotamia and Egypt around 4,000-3,000 BC. The last ice age ended about 10,000 BC. The land bridges between Asia and the Americas and mainland Asia and Japan are well known – at the time, sea levels were significantly lower than the present day due to water trapped in glaciers. This also means, however, that most Ice Age coastal areas are now under water. The earliest civilizations generally originated near rivers close to the ocean. I think it’s therefore plausible that some rudimentary civilizations existed towards the end of the last Ice Age, only to be washed away or submerged as the ice caps melted. If so, the evidence would be very difficult to uncover. I can’t imagine this would be anything spectacular like Atlantis (if so we should already have found more evidence), but the possibility seems both plausible and intriguing. I think we should at least be open to the possibility that our knowledge of ancient history remains incomplete.

I think art is entirely subjective. That is to say, the difference between a masterpiece and a piece of junk is entirely due to historical coincidence rather than inherent value. Value is determined by contemporary consensus. Artists who stand at the pinnacle of this consensus can arbitrarily move standards of quality by claiming innovation. Consumers and lesser artists face a choice between accepting the consensus or having bad taste. In this sense, a great artist is either a conformer or unbelievably lucky for having had the right talents at the right moment.

Of course, art also has value beyond this element of mass consensus. This is at the level of individual taste. I think this is where one finds the most interesting art – the way people spin around on their chairs; a random gust of wind; the random patterns one finds on bathroom walls. To me, at least, these art works are often more fascinating than the things found in museums.

I just encountered an interesting case of path dependence while watching a popular TV show in Japan. Like many places in the world, people standing on escalators in Japan move to one side to let people pass. The funny thing is in Tokyo, people stand on the left and pass to the right, while in Osaka, people stand on the right and pass on the left. I think the pattern in Tokyo is intuitive, since people drive on the left side of the road in Japan and hence the passing lane is on the right. When walking around in Tokyo, it’s often useful to remember this, since unlike the US, people naturally move to their left when they’re about to bump into you.

Apparently, the pattern in Osaka was established in 1970 during the World Exposition, when Japan Railway employees encouraged people to stand on the right when on an escalator (this was an act of courtesy towards visiting foreigners such as those from the US who predominantly stand on the right). After this custom was established, it has remained in place to the present day, 30+ years after the end of the Exposition.

The TV program staff then went on a trip to identify the precise station between Tokyo and Osaka where the pattern reverses. Apparently, there is no gray area – the customs reverse abruptly after one station in between. This was all very fascinating and reinforced my belief that Japanese TV is both very bizarre and very cool.